daredevil muffin-y genius

Entries tagged with feminism

I lost roughly three years of my life during the overtime of the Germany-Algeria game. The Fennec Foxes were strong and fast, laying bare all of Die Mannschaft's defense weaknesses. But, well, if you are a fan of football and were following this ordeal, your medium of choice will already have overflown.

If you are a sensible being following US politics, or, hell, if you are a woman actually living here, your day was even worse. To see this current Supreme Court of the United States deliver yet another blow to women's & reproductive rights while fostering corporate & extreme religious interests? Much more devastating than getting hit in the face by some fellow football player.

...which is not to say that everything is dire in the justice landscape in the United States; marriage equality keeps rolling on, and I enjoyed marching in San Francisco Pride 2014 with the NCLR for the #BornPerfect campaign, a lot. Hello!

Personally, the sun's on the horizon, too: I have moved, to the location I wanted to live for quite a while now, into a house that's perfect -- rather Better Homes and Gardens, which is what my petty little soul actually likes.

Never mind. Yet another technical issue in the online form that made me lose three hours of my life, three hours that I don't have given my workload. Before I return to the world of non-functioning tech platforms I need to climb, and soon, have some fannish thoughts:

Up in wine country where he'd whisked me last weekend, the boy and I went to see Hansel and Gretel, and the second part of the latest Die Hard.

I don't even know what it's called, precisely, but it's the latest ( Die Hard )

In conclusion, there's a reason I'm usually careful about my movie choices. I'm still willing to compromise, but not like this. Is there a site like Feminists Who Love Action Movies where I can seek counsel next time?

Sitting at the hairdresser’s. Let’s hope it all turns out well. Quite possibly I feel more apprehensive about this three-hour visit than my one year here in the US.

Priorities, I have them.

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Liv has written a short post on Singleness in response to the Living Singlearticle by Moya on the same topic, i.e. relationships privileged merely due to their romantic element, with a queer viewpoint in both cases.

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Okay, I have to go back to my reading. I love taking wine law, don’t get me wrong; like the one on race and sexuality it is one reason for coming to this very school, and so far I seem to be very good at it. ;) But those 100+ pages to prepare for each class require quite a serious commitment of time.

In more pleasant fannish news, Remix is beta'd twice now, and I'm eying Remix Madness as we speak. Won't have time tomorrow, family visit and driving down the Autobahn for an art fair & a night of Scandinavian films with my graphic designer friend.

Also on tumblr, because what is that platform for if not graphics? Surely not conversation.

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To make this a little more varied in fandoms, randomeliza too likes Teen Wolf 2011: Come squee with us here in the post, and feel free to check out a certain male actor on the show having taped himself masturbating just slightly off-screen.

Remember to watch live, DVR and watch again ASAP, tweet about it by using #FightTheFuture, check into GetGlue, tell your friends to watch it (especially those who are LOST fans, they may be interested in seeing Desmond Henry Ian Cusick again), etc. etc. Let's hope the ratings will pick up again this week.

(And if you're interested, here are the results for last week's campaign, pretty impressive numbers.)

a) There is (same procedure as every year-ish, but I realise only Germans find that funny) another Friday Twitter campaign from Fringenuity. And while I think it's inferred from my earlier glowing reviews of Chris Payne's Who Killed The Electric Car and The Revenge of the Electric Car here in this blog, it bears repeating I'm all for Nissan going all the way with the Leaf, and of course them supporting my show.

c) In more general Save Our Show! news, there's the new and -- literally -- cool-looking Campaign #FRINGE5 which, I quote, has "the support of the great Ari Margolis, who makes these amazing promos for the show, and also the Spanish humorist Berto Romero, the sweet Yvette Nicole Brown ("Shirley Bennet" on the tv show Community) and our favorite shape-shifter Nadie aka Michelle Krusiec".

2. The thing is, actual facts will never sway the kind of people who are for all kinds of malicious reasons waging this war on women, but maybe it's ammunition for a debate with the general, sane public?

loligo in her post asks for recommendations of books providing "parent education and other supportive services to first-time parents living in stressful situations."

We already have a formal curriculum that we use in home visits with the families. The materials I am buying would be supplements to that -- they are optional resources that parents can access according to their needs or interests. [...] The central aim of the program is to strengthen the parent-child bond. I absolutely believe that acknowledging the genuine hardships of parenting is part of that process, but it is important that our materials ultimately affirm the importance of parenting, and the rewards of creating a strong relationship with one's child.

Not that my day was terrible; it was topped by a company-paid outing with folks I adore (and alcohol as well).

But what really got me through the day were these women activists in Egypt. I've seen there are claims the original videos are -- not even untrue but incomplete, fragmentary. This is almost certainly true; I'm not naive enough to think the Western media doesn't present particular views (and particular views on these particular views). And yet, even if one single women is violated like that -- even if another soldier afterward hurries by to cover her up and help her: how can anyone claim that in any way negates the sanctioned violence that just happened in this situation, under the eyes of dozens of uniforms whose only purpose would in fact be to protect the people, half of which are women?

Just took my sister to the airport; she's flying back home to Munich. Leaving me with a feeling of loss, but also, as ever, recognition and gratitude. Our last topic was, not unsurprisingly, Being A Woman In A Male-Dominated Workplace(tm).

Most of the stories we all tell -- let alone the analyses we do -- aren't particularly cheerful, of course. Cautionary Tales and (Slightly) Better Way To Approach It, oh my. But the worst has always been that profound sense of being alone -- not in the world, necessarily, but in the workspace around you. The internet has given me friends I cherish beyond belief, in part because they understand, on all the levels that matter, but you're not right here right now. And depending on the line of work, your peers and The System both play such a large part: even if you know better, you still feel lost.

Which in certain aspects reminds me of an argument I encounter a lot in life, especially work life (no balance to be found there): that just getting one woman into a position of power is going to help; surely she alone -- literally -- means all is well and everybody is happy, read: represented. But turns out that women are human beings, who ultimately answer and stand only for themselves: they're not symbols; each of them is not some semi-mystical pinnacle of female wisdom (whatever the hell that's supposed to be; if it was ever passed out, I was clearly buying a lolly somewhere else) throughout the ages or even just the present day. Nor are they Just Like Men [Only With Boobs]. And of course women are not only women-- they're people of colour; they're queer; they're disabled too, all at once sometimes; none of these are separate identities.

Though they are viewed that way. So, not if but when something happens, a decision, a direction doesn't work out, it's All Women / PoC / Queers / People with Disabilities who are Not Up To The Task At Hand, natch, the proof is right there; can't you see? And I say, No, no I can't see that. All I see is one person yet again proving that the misconception of token folks needs to die. That we all need both quantity and quality of talent outside the white male demographic.

So yes, buying more GLBTQA books -- and movies and other media -- is great and dandy; but there are two thing that come to mind:

First, those pitfalls of believing any queer book is a good book, because duh, no, and Deepa says it much better why criticism and, hel-lo, content matter perhaps even more in this section of the book world.

Second, there's a much more insidious view: the belief that any such action is a generosity, a gift -- that you are doing me a favour when you read my queer story, employ me as a woman, don't change the topic when I talk about disability. You don't. You are doing this for yourself; you will be benefit from it, and I don't only mean additional knowledge of the world as it really is for people who are not you, your family, your circles, or the warm and fuzzy feeling that comes only from Having Done Good, Whee. I do mean your deep and profound joy at reading my words and worlds. I do mean your hard-cash, money-in-the-bank financial advantages of employing me as a person, because I don't just do good work but do it better. I do mean your perspectives on life, on the realisations of possibilities and powers you have so you can find a better path.

Facts and statistics about the measurable gain from inclusion exist; the truth is out there. But it's pretty clear they still need to go in here, too: your mind, my mind.

In Let's Close Some Tabs! news, mswyrr wrote a post I wanted to share because God, it bugs me too, so much:

I just finished watching “Page Eight” with Rachel Weisz and Bill Nighy. It was mostly good. Warning: this post is not about the parts of it that were good. You see, it reminded me a bit too much of “The Girl in the Cafe,” another Bill Nighy film. It does irritate the fuck out of me that I have seen not one but two political dramas with a liberal bent starring Bill Nighy where his middle-aged character is paired up with a hot, young woman made vulnerable to him by dire circumstances. Because they're just so grateful and desperate and vulnerable, you see! So very much.

She examines another show -- Boardwalk Empire -- but needn't stop there, I suspect, because the BBC and HBO are everything but alone in their tendencies to portray old white powerful men's fantasies of much, much younger women as the norm. Anyway, there's tables! Comparisons! Unsurprising results!

I had planned to use "Veni, vidi, vicious feelings" as a subject line, but then I had to laugh about my icon choice...

Speaking of purchases, I'm sad the computer store hasn't gotten back to me yet after my invitatio ad offerendum for a new desktop computer with hardware better than the e-waste DELL obviously shove into their creations (three graphic card failures in two years, with weeks and weeks of repairs and service that doesn't deserve the name? Never again, DELL).

Mostly because I still have vids in my open tabs that I thus cannot simply watch, notably from Marina and Kuwdora (she who vidded KT Tunstall's Suddenly I See so wonderfully to the women of Castle).

And then a high profile terrorist died after, I'm told, more than 500 billions of dollars were spent on a decades long manhunt. To no one's surprise, he hadn't gone very far, just to the neigbouring country from where he was last seen before ordering the death of about 3000 people in the World Trade Centre. The way this event was presented in the media felt a bit as if Obama was an action hero played by Samuel Jackson, at last firing the decisive shot that kills the film's villain. And then there is a happy ending. It occurred to me that if Osama bin Laden had been captured alive, it would have been incredibly inconvenient and messy for all parties concerned. Would he have ended up in Guantanamo? Would he have gotten a trial? If so, would he have used all the money from his very rich (and quite familiar with American business) family to hire a team of lawyers, or would it have been a military tribunal? What would the defense have brought up? It was all Mohammad Atta's idea, and our client can't be judged by any unbiased jury because there can't be any? The US was fine with our client as long as he was busy agitating against the Russians in Afghanistan? Or maybe he'd have insisted on defending himself and would have behaved as contemptously of the court as Slovodan Milosevic did when they tried him in Den Haag.

There is a reason why so many films prefer to kill off their villains. (Unless they're already planning the sequel.)

I'm really trying to replace "DIAF" in my lexicon with "(go) jump in a lake" (JIAL).

"DIAF" is incredibly satisfying to say, especially when "motherfucking" in thrown in for further emphasis. It definitely speaks to my RAEG. But I've been thinking how it's pretty messed up. I don't actually want anyone to die in a fire, you know? So why do I keep saying it?

"Go jump in a lake" is less satisfying, but it has the benefit of being true. I would actually not mind if all jerks who can swim took a moment to go jump in a fucking lake. It's also fun because it's historical slang, and historical slang is COOLNESS. Anachronisms FTW!

legionseagle writes a post titled testing the boundaries, which deals with an OFC (Original Female Character) of hers in a Sherlock fic (i.e. in a genre that conceptually requires several outsiders to be present in a story) and the "Mary Sue" tag this her character received on AO3, but the whole discussion in the comments is just amazingly illuminating:

Basically, a very significant majority of the fandom's criticism of River can be summarised as:

"Prisoner at the bar; you stand accused of being Jack Harkness while in possession of a pair of ovaries. Do you plead guilty or not guilty?"

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Over the course of the day, I've eaten a whole pack of these. They're one of the few junk foods I love at all times of the day, month, year, and the fact my sis bought these puppies for me in Philly only makes them sweeter. :)

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Today, I saw a full-grown woman, in writing, call herself "a little princess" without more than fig-leaf irony. In light of a certain "fairytale wedding", I'm glad at least Game of Thrones is v. effectively doing away with notions of how fancy a life that necessarily means. But then again, self-descriptions like this one are a decent-enough warning for folks like me and a like enticement to some who are less Republican -- not the US Party (also not the US Party! version), I hasten to add -- than me.

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Here, before I watch Fringe 3x20, "6:02AM EST", have an insta-rec:

The Package Deal by Ziparumpazoo (PG, spoilers for 3x14 "6B") She drew these two men together and forced them, sometimes painfully, to build their own warped version of a family. They're a package deal. An If/Then statement. It's that simple.

In a fandom that loves Olivia -- and that I love inter alia for that reason -- there are still not that many who write her like this: layered and complex, pitch-perfect. There's a "fluff" label, but I don't feel it fits this quiet but resounding story.

The differences of the various versions of Who Wants To Be A Millionnaire are obvious to anyone who's ever compared, say, the Germany and the UK versions, not to mention Australia and the US -- and these are all not just Western but historically Germanic countries. At the same time, on a gut-level, I find the Russian and, to some degree, French approach of the audience completely understandable, even though as part thereof, I'd probably chose the right answer -- provided I know it, of course; probabilities decrease dramatically if it's German pop culture-based or has to do with vehicles -- but not to help and not to spite but because I know better. Which in turn is probably be a lot less individualist than I think it is. ;)

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In srs-bizness-light-hearted-treatment news, mswyrr made me laugh by posting this: